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Agree with this. All our strikers are bad and none of them will score anywhere near enough goals, but Daka looks the best fit for the type of football Cifuentes (apparently) wants to play.

I know he is! I said so in my post! The point is more about fit within the overall system in the context of this specific game. Ayew drops deep and slows down play, Daka can stretch the defence by running in behind which will allow more space for our wingers and midfielders to create. Carranza may be the solution but as we've not actually seen him play yet it's hard to say. Would like to see him given some minutes on Saturday.

Not sure how best to go about it but Ricardo simply has to start. He is too good not to. Personally I'd drop Hamza and slot him in at RB but I think Marti quite likes his physicality. So a flat midfield 3 might be the best option. Centre back partnership is a doozy - they were decent against Charlton, very good against Birmingham and poor against Oxford. Maybe stick with it for now and hope they can develop together. As others have discussed the Soumare/Skipp experiment has to end now. Think James will come in for one of them, although there's an argument to say Winks should come in as well. Up top I'd like to see either Daka or Carranza come in for Ayew. We need somene who will stretch the defence. Yes I'm aware of Daka's limitations but he is at least willing to press and run in behind which will be crucial on Saturday as Cov won't sit deep.

This isn't the politics thread so I don't want to ruin it but the freeports conspiracy theory that's done on the rounds on leftish social media is some of the dumbest stuff I've ever heard. They're just Enterprise Zones with small tax breaks and even smaller customs benefits. Anyone telling you they're part of some sovereign individual plot to sell off Britain doesn't know anything about them.

Interesting perspective. On transport, I am noticing a difference in places that have a combined authority. Those powers seem to be getting passed up to that city-region level which makes sense for more strategic projects. Greater Manchester has done this very effectively but the likes of Liverpool and West Yorkshire now following a similar model. I know the local government reorganisation is controversial but perhaps covering that wider area will allow them to look at transport more strategically across the county and beyond.

Think you probably know this but planning is a bit more complicated than saying yes or no to a planning application. It's the place-making side of local authority planning departments that have been decimated. 30 years ago it was common to have an in-house chief architect and chief planner doing proper urban design work. These days there are barely enough resources to do building/planning control work. This is the kind of thing that happens when council budgets are cut by 40% or more.

Worth bearing in mind that local authority planning departments have been completely gutted due to austerity cuts. I'm not familiar with Leicester City Council's planning team but those I have dealt with are less than half the size they were 20 years ago.

The reality is that most city/town centres are essentially too big. The retail-led high street grew in the post-industrial and post-war era as shopping became a leisure activity. It reached its apex/nadir (depending on your viewpoint) in the early 2000s with the development of inner city shopping centres like Westfield as a response to concerns that out of town complexes like Fosse Park were having a negative impact on town/city centre economies. The rise of internet retail over the last 20 years has killed those as well, although some have effectively pivoted to more experience and food/drink led offerings. There are some interesting cases of towns/cities changing how they manage their centres. Stockport is pretty much making its town centre smaller - converting empty shops into flats and attracting bars and restaurants with cheap rents. Bradford built an enormous park/square smack bang in the middle of the city centre to give it a real focal point and make it attractive for families. On a smaller scale, Altrincham has responded to its town centre retail offer being gutted by the Trafford Centre by turning into a proper foodie destination. There's no future for retail-led centres apart from the largest cities - London, Birmingham, Manchester etc. Smaller cities like Leicester will need to attract people in different ways. Think the key thing for every city/town is to make it a pleasant place to visit - keep the streets clean, empty bins, tackle petty crime, brighten up shop fronts etc.

Pleased with the outs. Would have liked to ship out Kristiansen and a couple of others ideally. Pleased with the two midfield signings. I’m still worried about the strikers. Don’t know much about Carranza so I’ll reserve judgement. But I feel we still need a proper target man and would have really liked us to go all out for Ivanovic. That said, the main priority this summer was to get us on a more stable financial footing which does look to have been achieved.

Jakub Hamza Okoli Vestergaard Thomas Ricardo Soumare Fatawu Ayew Monga Daka Not great, but it'll have to do.

Yep, he did this several times and it's been a major fault in his game for several years. In a backs to the wall situation like the last 30 minutes on Saturday he's useful. Good at blocking, last ditch tackles etc. Similar to his man of the match performance against West Brom in our promotion season. Unfortunately he is sloppy in possession, switches off too often and is poor positionally. He scored a good goal against Huddersfield but was otherwise really bad, and was atrocious when he came on at Preston. He's far from our biggest problem, but he's a limited player and if we're relying on him in either central midfield or at right back this season we're in bother.

A theory: he has undiagnosed Lyme Disease.

Even today he can’t get into the squad. He must be absolutely terrible in training.

Nice lad but not very good. When he first came into the team I thought he'd end up a decent player in League 1 and nothing I've seen from him since has changed my mind.

This is where I'm at. I'm not a booer myself but don't object to giving the players both barrels after a performance like that. But I really don't like the self-depracting schtick that's crept in over the last 3 or 4 years. We can demand better without constantly doing ourselves down.

We need to sign a striker. But of those two, I’d play Daka over Ayew because at least he can press.

Marti has come into a very difficult situation. I like his attitude and he didn’t shy away from the supporters at the end yesterday. That said, if he starts Soumare, Vestergaard and Ayew next week he will lose my support quite quickly.

Yes I think we do. Cifuentes likes his teams to press high, which we've seen some evidence of in the first couple of games. Most of our centre backs are slow so we need some kind of screening midfielder otherwise we will be constantly at risk from counter attacks. Winks at the base of midfield is fine when we've got the ball but when we don't have it he needs someone alongside him.

Skipp and Soumare are both dreadful, but Soumare is more of a liability. He switches off, frequently wanders out of position and loses his man. Skipp is clearly limited and very low on confidence but I feel like alongside Winks he might not be a disaster if he's just asked to sit and protect the defence. Unfortunately we don't have too many other options as Page looks more like a 10 at the moment than someone who can play as a 6 next to Winks. We desperately need some reinforcements in that area.

Strongly disagree with this. We have about half a team capable of achieving promotion: Bilal, Fatawu, Mavididi, Winks, Jakub...maybe Faes, Vestergaard and Monga. Our midfield is lightweight and has zero creativity. We don't have a striker who can score 15 goals a season. We have one excellent full back but he's regularly injured. The rest aren't very good.

I was there as well, good away day that. Yeah, injury time goal from Dyer which took a massive deflection.

Would have been perfectly happy with Winks leaving a couple of months or even 2 or 3 weeks ago. As we have done business at our usual glacial pace I don't have any faith that we'd be able to bring in a viable replacement so would be left with Skipp and Soumare as the league's least mobile central midfield pairing.

Can relate to Faes to be honest, as I also hate Leicester City Football Club quite a lot of the time.